Skip the platitudes, please

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				THE
Column Archive				VIRGINIA GAZETTE
				WILLIAMSBURG, VIRGINIA
Skip the platitudes, please				August 9, 2003

The ancient Greeks thought that Delphi was the omphalos, or navel, of the earth. There it was that the famous priestess, after getting herself blitzed on bay leaves, issued her garbled, though portentous, predictions about the rise and fall of great empires and city- states. It was to Delphi, then, that political leaders of all stripes trekked, hoping for positive prognostications about their dubious futures.

And so it is with Toano, which, if not the navel of the earth, is at least the belly button of James City County. With their usual wanton wisdom, even the gerrymandering Republicans saw the sacrosanct nature of the Toano precinct. Mustering all their prescience and altruism, they removed it from the clutches of Barlow the Evildoer and placed it under the serene aegis of the right-thinking Melanie, priestess of York.

Little wonder, then, that Toano has become a hub of activity for politicians looking to foster their careers or simply remain in office.

Even Jim Kennedy (R-Stonehouse), who thought he might separate himself from the mystical magnetism of Toano, has reconsidered. Though he opined at one point that birthing babies might be more to his liking than serving his local constituents on the Board of Supervisors, Kennedy changed his mind in less time than it would take to birth a toad, and is now back in the race against Andy Bradshaw.

According to Kennedy, so overwhelmed was he by the surge of support for his candidacy that he couldn’t resist returning to the fold and attempting to hold onto the board seat for the Republicans. In an apparent attempt to avert rioting in the streets of Toano, Kennedy has deferred familial formations and has left Bradshaw wondering what kind of a phantasm he’s dealing with.

No less important will be the contest for delegate in the 96^th. In this race, Melanie Rapp (R), the current Pooh Bah of Toano and York, is being opposed by newcomer Philip Forgit. Rapp, who has taken to traveling around her district with a rather strange mélange that resembles the followers of Pan, successfully fended off Democratic and independent onslaughts in her last election and is looking to do the same this time around.

Perhaps typical of her disdain for her opponent, Rapp has of yet posted no issues for discussion on her campaign Web site. Given the horrendous performance of the crypto-crustaceans in the state legislature last session, she is no doubt wise to cover her tracks and rely solely on her conservative Republicanism to win.

Forgit, who was hoofing it around Toano last weekend with a broken toe, is thought by many Democrats to represent the Republican wing of the Democratic Party. According to a flier he’s handing out to prospective constituents, he wants to “set priorities” and restore the “Virginia value of fiscal conservatism to our state finances.”

This quite naturally sends shivers through the timbers of many Democrats, since these are the same mantras that were trumpeted in the flier floods emanating from Paul Jost and Tommy Norment. Like Forgit, they too talked of setting priorities, funding education, and taking care of transportation woes. And, like Forgit, they were going to accomplish all this in the context of fiscal conservatism.

Moreover, Forgit appears just as loathe as Jost, Norment and Rapp to discuss or support such basic Democratic issues as a woman’s right to choose, affirmative action and gay rights.

On the other hand, Forgit is correct when he says that all priorities “tie back to the budget.” The problem arises, of course, when the budget becomes so out of whack that, regardless of priorities, there is simply not enough cash to fund the basic commitments the state has legislatively made to things like education and transportation.

If Forgit is to set himself apart from Rapp and the Republicans, he must come up with specific proposals for either raising taxes to fund priorities or, as W.C. O’Donovan suggested in a recent editorial, closing the present loopholes in the tax code. Unfunded mandates might be a good place to begin.

In this election campaign, let’s forget such belabored blither as the “Virginia value of fiscal conservatism” and get down to brass tacks with specific proposals for raising the money needed to fund our most basic priorities. Only then shall we see much difference between Rapp, who probably agrees with most of Forgit’s generalizations, and her Democratic opponent..

Alluring as the Toano area may be to political candidates, they should not forget that we too have our priorities. Among other things, we’d like to keep our remaining green spaces, such as Forge Rd., out of the clutches of developers. We’d also like to free our fine elementary and middle schools from the tightwads and state budget crunchers devoted to fiscal conservatism.

But most of all we’d like the politicians who come looking for our votes to replace their platitudes, slogans and politicalspeak with solid, specific proposals for getting our county and state out of the ballooning budgetary mess in which we find ourselves.